Thirty years ago, a Russian train left Helsinki for Moscow carrying psychologists and educators from North America who were participants in the first citizen diplomacy project sponsored by the Association for Humanistic Psychology (AHP). That train trip was the start of a 20-year Track-II1 Diplomacy Project, and evolved into a global teacher and student environmental activist project that brought together hundreds of teachers and students not only from the United States and the former Soviet Union, but colleagues and students in many other countries including Australia, the Czech Republic, and Spain.
"We must be scholars and activists. It is simply not enough to be scientists—that is to measure and calculate, but rather we must be willing to dedicate ourselves to causes—to be activists who are willing to commit to environmental and humanitarian issues.”
-Dr. Jennie Springer, Principal, Dunwoody High School, From an address given at GTP Environmental Summit, Simpsonwood Conference Center, Norcross, October 2, 1996
The AHP Soviet Exchange Project: 1983-1990 and beyond
Seven years have gone by since AHP sent its first delegation to the Soviet Union. During that time, over 150 North American psychologists, psychotherapists, and educators have represented AHP as delegates in the U.S.S.R. A smaller but growing number of our Soviet counterparts have visited the U.S. This article describes the events, people, progress, and future of the AHP Soviet Exchange Project. Delegates on the first three trips were truly explorers. Without official invitation, they sought ways to establish ties to prestigious institutes, universities, and schools in the Soviet Union. With each new encounter was the hope that this might lead to more lasting, satisfying, and in-depth relationships. The early visits set the stage for more organized and official relationships with Soviet colleagues and institutions. Strong ties were developed with colleagues in Moscow, Leningrad, and Tbilisi, and more recently in Tallinn, Vilnius, and Kiev. Two areas of collaboration with Soviets have emerged over the years: psychotherapy and humanistic education. AHP psychotherapists have worked with groups in six cities, demonstrating practice and discussing recent trends in humanistic psychology. The humanistic education focus has progressed through two offlcial agreements. In the most recent one (1989), the AHP, Georgia State University, and the Academy of Pedagogical Sciences signed a three-year agreement in which American and Soviet scholars and teachers would work together through a series of exchanges, writing conferences, and field testing to develop teaching materials focusing on global thinking. The work of both sides will culminate in an international conference co-hosted by both sides in Leningrad during the summer of 1992.The more that the common people contact each other the more our leaders will be obliged to contact each other as well.-Yulia Siroyezhina
The Global Thinking Project engages students from different countries in the exploration of global environmental topics by means of a computer-mediated telecommunications network. The project grew out of more than 15 trips to the former Soviet Union sponsored by the Association for Humanistic Psychology beginning in 1983. Through seminars, classroom visits, laboratory demonstrations, and other informal and formal experiences, international agreements were signed between Georgia State University and the Russian Academy of Education. Currently, the project brings together nearly 70 teachers and 2,500 students from six countries to learn to think globally. This article outlines the history, nature, and activities of the Global Thinking Project, and discusses global thinking as a way of thinking that can serve as a model of learning in classrooms in different cultures.
Computer Networks in the Global Thinking Project
The First GTP Network, Dec. 1989To link schools by computers to the Internet presented problems. For one, the Soviet schools had no computers, and we were unsure if we could connect them to the Internet. Phone lines were scarce in Soviet schools (American schools, as well), and often the phone line was in the Director’s office, sometimes hundreds of feet from the location of science classrooms where the computers needed to be installed.[1]
Figure: The GTP Telecommunications Network, 10 schools and two countries.
Global Thinking Project Network Diagram, 1989
Phil Gang of the Institute for Educational Studies made arrangements to Apple Computer to seek their support. It just so happened that there was a delegation of Russian teachers and researchers being hosted by our project in Atlanta. They accompanied us to the Apple headquarters in Atlanta. Apple agreed to donate six Macintosh SE 20[2] computers and printers. Hayes Micro Modem Company donated six 2400-baud modems. Apple also decided that Mr. Gary Lieber, a systems analyst with Apple should join us when we carried the computers to Moscow.
At each school, Gary set up the technology that would enable teachers and students to logon to a network to send email using AppleLink, as well as post and read messages on bulletin boards we set up in the Apple Global Education network. Each computer and modem had to be programmed to connect with a service in Moscow, which connected to an interface in Western Europe and then to the U.S. through standard telephone lines. Amazingly, we go the system to work in every school in Russia, and by the end of the two-week trip in December 1989 we had established the first Global Thinking Project Network (Hassard, 1997).[3]
[1] To solve the Director’s office-classroom distance problem, I brought 1000 feet of telephone line and used it in Schools 157 and 239 in St. Petersburg.[2] The Macintosh SE20 is a personal computer that was manufactured between 1987 – 1990 with a 20 MB internal hard drive and slots for two dark disks. An external modem supplied by Hayes, connected to the local phone line made it possible to connect to a network.[3] Nearly all the classrooms in the GTP had only one computer. It wasn’t until the late 1990s that classrooms had more than one computer connected to the Internet. By using cooperative groups in each class, we worked out a way for teams of students to have “computer time” to send email, upload data, and participate in conferences.
Jack Hassard
Material sent by Jack on Aug. 20, 2017...
Citizen Diplomacy to Youth Activism: The Story of the Global Thinking Project
by Jack Hassardhttps://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-319-11608-2_25
Thirty years ago, a Russian train left Helsinki for Moscow carrying psychologists and educators from North America who were participants in the first citizen diplomacy project sponsored by the Association for Humanistic Psychology (AHP). That train trip was the start of a 20-year Track-II1 Diplomacy Project, and evolved into a global teacher and student environmental activist project that brought together hundreds of teachers and students not only from the United States and the former Soviet Union, but colleagues and students in many other countries including Australia, the Czech Republic, and Spain.
"We must be scholars and activists. It is simply not enough to be scientists—that is to measure and calculate, but rather we must be willing to dedicate ourselves to causes—to be activists who are willing to commit to environmental and humanitarian issues.”
-Dr. Jennie Springer, Principal, Dunwoody High School, From an address given at GTP Environmental Summit, Simpsonwood Conference Center, Norcross, October 2, 1996
The AHP Soviet Exchange Project: 1983-1990 and beyond
by Jack Hassardhttp://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0022167890303002
Seven years have gone by since AHP sent its first delegation to the Soviet Union. During that time, over 150 North American psychologists, psychotherapists, and educators have represented AHP as delegates in the U.S.S.R. A smaller but growing number of our Soviet counterparts have visited the U.S. This article describes the events, people, progress, and future of the AHP Soviet Exchange Project. Delegates on the first three trips were truly explorers. Without official invitation, they sought ways to establish ties to prestigious institutes, universities, and schools in the Soviet Union. With each new encounter was the hope that this might lead to more lasting, satisfying, and in-depth relationships. The early visits set the stage for more organized and official relationships with Soviet colleagues and institutions. Strong ties were developed with colleagues in Moscow, Leningrad, and Tbilisi, and more recently in Tallinn, Vilnius, and Kiev. Two areas of collaboration with Soviets have emerged over the years: psychotherapy and humanistic education. AHP psychotherapists have worked with groups in six cities, demonstrating practice and discussing recent trends in humanistic psychology. The humanistic education focus has progressed through two offlcial agreements. In the most recent one (1989), the AHP, Georgia State University, and the Academy of Pedagogical Sciences signed a three-year agreement in which American and Soviet scholars and teachers would work together through a series of exchanges, writing conferences, and field testing to develop teaching materials focusing on global thinking. The work of both sides will culminate in an international conference co-hosted by both sides in Leningrad during the summer of 1992.The more that the common people contact each other the more our leaders will be obliged to contact each other as well.-Yulia Siroyezhina
Teaching Students to Think Globally
by Jack Hassardhttp://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/00221678970371003
The Global Thinking Project engages students from different countries in the exploration of global environmental topics by means of a computer-mediated telecommunications network. The project grew out of more than 15 trips to the former Soviet Union sponsored by the Association for Humanistic Psychology beginning in 1983. Through seminars, classroom visits, laboratory demonstrations, and other informal and formal experiences, international agreements were signed between Georgia State University and the Russian Academy of Education. Currently, the project brings together nearly 70 teachers and 2,500 students from six countries to learn to think globally. This article outlines the history, nature, and activities of the Global Thinking Project, and discusses global thinking as a way of thinking that can serve as a model of learning in classrooms in different cultures.
Computer Networks in the Global Thinking Project
The First GTP Network, Dec. 1989To link schools by computers to the Internet presented problems. For one, the Soviet schools had no computers, and we were unsure if we could connect them to the Internet. Phone lines were scarce in Soviet schools (American schools, as well), and often the phone line was in the Director’s office, sometimes hundreds of feet from the location of science classrooms where the computers needed to be installed.[1]
Figure: The GTP Telecommunications Network, 10 schools and two countries.
Phil Gang of the Institute for Educational Studies made arrangements to Apple Computer to seek their support. It just so happened that there was a delegation of Russian teachers and researchers being hosted by our project in Atlanta. They accompanied us to the Apple headquarters in Atlanta. Apple agreed to donate six Macintosh SE 20[2] computers and printers. Hayes Micro Modem Company donated six 2400-baud modems. Apple also decided that Mr. Gary Lieber, a systems analyst with Apple should join us when we carried the computers to Moscow.
At each school, Gary set up the technology that would enable teachers and students to logon to a network to send email using AppleLink, as well as post and read messages on bulletin boards we set up in the Apple Global Education network. Each computer and modem had to be programmed to connect with a service in Moscow, which connected to an interface in Western Europe and then to the U.S. through standard telephone lines. Amazingly, we go the system to work in every school in Russia, and by the end of the two-week trip in December 1989 we had established the first Global Thinking Project Network (Hassard, 1997).[3]
[1] To solve the Director’s office-classroom distance problem, I brought 1000 feet of telephone line and used it in Schools 157 and 239 in St. Petersburg.[2] The Macintosh SE20 is a personal computer that was manufactured between 1987 – 1990 with a 20 MB internal hard drive and slots for two dark disks. An external modem supplied by Hayes, connected to the local phone line made it possible to connect to a network.[3] Nearly all the classrooms in the GTP had only one computer. It wasn’t until the late 1990s that classrooms had more than one computer connected to the Internet. By using cooperative groups in each class, we worked out a way for teams of students to have “computer time” to send email, upload data, and participate in conferences.